“Wow!” I say. “Really?” How quickly in life you can go from taking walking for granted to one day being amazed that someone might let you sit in a wheelchair.
“Yeah,” he says. “So that’s exciting, right?”
“You bet your ass it is,” I say.
“Somebody bring you a pastry?” Henry says. His deep blue scrubs are a flattering color. I don’t mean that they specifically flatter him. I just mean I’ve noticed most of the nurses wear a sort of rose pink or light blue. But the navy blue he has is just much more attractive. If I were a nurse, I’d wear dark blue scrubs, sunup to sundown.
“Yeah,” I say. I can’t believe I forgot. I immediately grab the box. “My dad brought me a cinnamon roll.”
“Oh, man, my weak spot,” Henry says. “I don’t have much of a sweet tooth, but I love a good cinnamon roll.”
I am so eager to express my own love for cinnamon rolls that I stumble over my words. “That’s what . . . I am . . . you love? . . . Me, too.”
He laughs at me.
“I mean, I love cinnamon rolls. I have a cinnamon roll problem,” I say.
“No such thing,” he says.
Now that we are talking about it, I’m finding it impossible not to eat some of it right now. I open the box and pull off a piece. “You want some?” I ask.
“Oh, that’s OK,” Henry says.
“You sure? My dad got this from Primo’s. I’d argue it’s one of the best cinnamon rolls in all of Los Angeles.”
He puts his pen into his shirt pocket. “You know what? OK. I’d actually love a bite.”
I hand him the box. He picks off a small piece.
“Oh, come on,” I say. “Take a real piece.”
Henry laughs and takes a bigger piece. “I’m pretty sure this is How to Interact with Patients 101: Do Not Take Their Food.”
I laugh. “Nobody’s perfect.”
“No,” he says, chewing. “I suppose not.” And then he adds, “Damn, that’s good.”
“Right? I don’t want to brag, but I consider myself a cinnamon roll connoisseur.”
“I’m starting to believe it,” he says.
“Maybe I should start dropping hints to my visitors that I want more cinnamon rolls. I can probably get us a pretty good stash.”
“Tempting,” he says. “You feeling OK?”
The minute he says it, I remember who we really are, why we are really here, and I fall back down to earth just the littlest bit.
“Yeah,” I say. “I am. Each day feels a little bit better.”
“Think you’ll feel ready to get into the wheelchair tomorrow? It can be painful, moving around for the first time, being lifted, all of that. You up for it?”
“Are you kidding me? I’m up for anything.”
“Yeah,” he says. “That’s what I thought.”
He heads toward the door and then stops. “If you love cinnamon rolls as much as I do, then I’ll bet you also love churros. Have you had a churro?”
I give him an indignant look. “Are you kidding me? Have I had a churro? I’m from Los Angeles. I’ve had a churro.”
“Oh, well, excuse me . . . Sassypants.”
I start laughing. “Sassypants?”
He laughs, too. “I don’t know where that came from. It just popped out of my mouth. I’m as stunned as you are.”
I start laughing so hard that my eyes water. My whole body is convulsing. You realize when your body is broken just how much of it you use to laugh. But I can’t stop laughing. I don’t want to stop laughing.
“I guess it was a little weird of me to say,” he says.
“A little?” I say between breaths.
He laughs at himself with me.
And then, suddenly, there’s a shooting pain down my leg. It is sharp, and it is deep, and it is gut-wrenching. My laughter stops immediately. I cry out.
Henry rushes toward me.
The pain doesn’t stop. It hurts so badly I can’t breathe. I can’t talk. I look down at my feet and see that the toes on my right foot are clenched. I can’t unclench them.
“It’s OK, you’re OK,” he says. He moves toward my IV. “You’re gonna be OK in a second, I promise.” He comes back to me. He grabs my hand. He looks into my eyes. “Look at me,” he says. “C’mon, look at me. The pain is gonna go away in a second. You’re having a spasm. You just have to bear through it. It’s gonna be OK.”
I move my gaze to his face. I focus on him through the pain. I look into his eyes, and he stares into mine.
“You got this,” he says. “You got this.”
And then the pain begins to fade away.
My toes straighten.
My body relaxes.
I can breathe easily.
Henry moves his hands out of mine. He slides them up my arms to my shoulders. “You OK?” he says. “That had to hurt.”
“Yeah,” I say. “Yeah, I’m OK.”
“It’s good we are going to get you up and moving soon. Your body needs to be up and about.”
“Yeah,” I say.
“You did great.”
“Thanks.”
“You gonna be OK? On your own?”
“Yeah,” I say. “I think so.”
“If it happens again, just hit the button, and I’ll be here.” He takes his hands off me. With one swift motion, so subtle I’m almost not sure it happened, he moves a fallen hair out of my face. “Get some rest. Tomorrow is going to be a big day.”
“OK,” I say.
He smiles and heads out the door. At the very last second, he pops his head back in. “You’re badass, you know that?”
I say, “You probably say that to all your patients,” and then when he leaves, I think, What if he doesn’t? What if he only says that kind of stuff to me?
Ma’am,” the dealer says to me. We are sitting at his desk. I’ve already made my decision. “Are you sure you don’t want a new car? Something fun? Something a bit more . . . your style?”
I’m considering a used Toyota Camry. The dealer keeps trying to get me to look at this bright red Prius. Admittedly, I’d rather have the bright red Prius. There might have been a time in my life when I would have said “Screw it” and used all my money on the down payment for the Prius, forcing myself to figure out the rest when it came time. Because I love that red Prius.
But I’m trying to make new decisions so that they lead me to better places.
“The Camry’s fine,” I say. I already test-drove it. I’ve asked all the right questions. They want ninety-five hundred dollars for it. I tell him I’ll give him seventy-five hundred. We go back and forth. He gets me up to eight. He keeps going to his manager to get new negotiating numbers. Eventually, the manager comes over and whines about how little I am willing to pay for the car.
“If I sell it to you for less than eighty-five hundred, I won’t make any money off the deal,” he says. “You know, we need to make money. We can’t just be giving cars away.”
“OK,” I say. “I guess we can’t make this work.” I get up out of the chair and grab my purse.
“Sweetheart,” the manager says, “don’t be crazy.”
This is why Gabby has to keep talking about women’s rights and gender equality. It’s because of dipshits like this.
“Look, I told you I’d pay eight thousand even. Take it or leave it.”
Carl is an excellent negotiator. Really cutthroat. When I was a senior, Carl would take either Gabby or me to do all of his negotiating so we learned how to haggle. Mechanics, salesmen, plumbers, you name ’em, Carl made us negotiate prices with them directly. When Carl’s Jeep needed a new set of wheels, he stood out around the corner from the shop as I went in and tried to talk the guy down on his behalf. When I’d go back out to him to report the new price, Carl would shake his head and tell me I could do better. And I always did. I was especially proud when the tire guy threw in a free car detailing after my prodding. Gabby once got the guy repairing the hot-water heater to come down five hundred bucks. Carl and Tina took us out to Benihana that night to celebrate the victory.